The Fields of Death - Scarrow Simon - Страница 48
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‘Surely, if he retreats, then we have won our victory without having to shed a drop of blood, sir?’
Arthur looked at him sharply. ‘You fail to understand the wider strategy, Somerset. If we allow Massйna to retreat then we merely prolong the struggle. It was my intention to starve his army before our lines and then attack him when I judged that the moment was right. If Massйna has begun to retreat, then that means that his men have reached the end of their endurance. We must not let him escape. We must pursue him and defeat his army utterly. Then we will have a victory that will shorten the war. Is that clear?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Good. It is important that you grasp the need for speed in our reaction to Massйna’s moves. You must impress that on the commanders of every brigade in the army. Now go.’
Once Somerset had left, Arthur made his way up into one of the watchtowers, together with Cameron. From their elevated position the view over the ground in front of the fort was still obscured by fog, above which only the tops of hills were visible, like great leviathans rising from a milky sea. Arthur strained his eyes and ears but there was no movement, and not even the faintest sounds from the enemy camp. Where he might expect to hear the sounds of horses, farrier’s hammers or the thud of axes, there was silence, broken only by the cawing of crows.
He turned to Cameron.‘I can’t see a thing in this fog. Assemble your Light Company. By the way, do you have a pocket compass?’
‘A compass, sir? Why yes.’
‘Good; we shall need it. Leave word for my aide that we have headed due north. If he returns before we get back he is to follow on and report to me.’
‘Yes, sir.’
A quarter of an hour later Arthur, Cameron and the men of the Light Company filed quietly out of the fort and down the slope of the rise on which it had been constructed. All unnecessary kit had been left behind and each man carried only his musket and ammunition in a haversack. Ten men spread out ahead of the rest of the company as they advanced into the fog, keeping in sight of each other. They advanced cautiously, alert to any sound or movement ahead as they crept over the ground that had been cleared the previous year to deny any cover to the enemy. They had gone perhaps a mile when the grey outline of a burned farmhouse emerged from the fog. The company halted while two men went forward to investigate. They were gone for a few minutes before they returned and reported to Cameron. He listened, nodding, and then translated for Arthur.
‘The farm has been abandoned. There are the remains of a fire there, but it appears to have been built up and then allowed to burn itself out. They left a wagon to burn as well.’
‘A wagon, you say.’ Arthur thought briefly. The wagon might have been awaiting repair, or it might have been abandoned if there were insufficient draught animals to pull it. The fact that it had been burned meant that the enemy did not want the vehicle to fall into the hands of the British. ‘Let’s continue forward.’
Cameron struggled to contain his anxiety and nodded. As they passed through the farm Arthur noted that the fire in the yard between the buildings was fringed by the charred remains of other equipment: the spokes and timbers of a gun carriage, and what looked like the carcass of a horse, or a mule. Further on they came across a deserted camp site. Flattened grass gave way to latrine ditches and then a broad expanse of muddy ground, churned up by nailed boots, horseshoes and heavy iron-rimmed wheels. There were the remains of more fires where the remnants of equipment and looted furniture still smouldered.
Arthur turned to Cameron. ‘I’ve seen enough. Massйna is retreating. There’s no question of it.’
‘Yes, sir.’ Cameron paused a moment before he continued.‘What will you do, sir?’
‘I shall pursue him. I shall outmarch him and then, by God, I will destroy him.’
Marshal Massйna had gained over a day’s march by the time Arthur’s army took up the pursuit. The cavalry raced on ahead of the main column, tracking the line of retreat. The passage of the French army was not difficult to trace since they had left a now familiar trail of abandoned equipment and small bands of stragglers and wounded eagerly waiting to be taken into captivity rather than face the wrath of the local peasants. Further on the allied army came across the first of the villages devastated by the retreating French. Everything of value that could be carried away had been stripped from the houses. All the food was gone. Mutilated bodies lay sprawled in the streets. Three blackened bodies, a woman and two children, still hung from a tree over the remains of the fire that had been lit beneath them. The only survivor, an old man, bleakly informed Arthur that the dead had been tortured by the French in an attempt to discover any hidden supplies of food.
Thereafter the Portuguese battalions stopped taking French prisoners, and their British officers stood by in silence as the enemy’s throats were cut and their bodies left for the buzzards.
As the pursuit continued both armies crossed the frontier. Ahead lay the fortress town of Salamanca, where Massйna would be safe from his pursuers. That night, Arthur and Somerset rode to a small hill and surveyed the twinkling fires of the enemy sprawling across the rolling landscape half a day’s march to the east.
‘Frustrating, is it not?’ Arthur muttered as he stared towards the enemy. ‘To have chased them so far, but not quickly enough to force them to turn and fight.’
‘I suppose so, sir,’ Somerset replied. ‘But Massйna’s army is a spent force. It is a victory all the same.’
‘Victory?’ Arthur rubbed the bristles on his jaw. ‘No. Just a step on a very long road. But we shall reach the end by and by. Now we have to take the war into Spain. To do that we need to take the frontier fortresses of Ciudad Rodrigo, Badajoz and Almeida. It will be a bloody business, Somerset. Laying siege will take some time, and cost many lives.’
Arthur was about to turn his horse back towards the British camp when a cannon boomed out from the direction of the French camp, followed a moment later by another gun, and then more in a regular series of thuds that carried clearly to the ears of the British general and his aide. Arthur’s weary eyes scoured the ground between the two armies but there was no tell-tale flicker of shots to indicate a fight, just the steady report of French guns, firing into the night, one after another.
‘What the devil are they up to?’
Chapter 18
Napoleon
The Tuileries, Paris, 20 March 1811
‘Sire?’ The doctor stood away from the bed where the Empress lay moaning through gritted teeth. ‘May we talk?’
‘There is no time for talk,’ Napoleon said tersely as he sat on the edge of the bed, holding his wife’s hand.‘Just do your duty. See to it that my wife delivers the baby safely.’
The doctor glanced anxiously at Marie-Louise. She lay on her back, knees raised and arms flung out to each side. While Napoleon held one hand, one of her ladies in waiting held the other. Her face was waxen and gleamed in the shaft of light that entered the chamber through a tall window. Perspiration had matted her fair hair to her scalp, and as the doctor watched she let out another prolonged cry of agony before the contraction passed.
The doctor cleared his throat and then spoke softly.‘Sire, her imperial majesty has been in labour for nearly twenty hours. She is growing weaker all the time, and there is little sign of dilation. I must speak to you about the possible complications that may arise from a protracted labour.’
Napoleon stared at him for a moment and then nodded. He leaned across the bed and kissed his wife’s clenched brow. ‘My dearest, I must talk to the doctor. I’ll return in a moment.’
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